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Star Trek The Motion Picture
Star Trek The Motion Picture is a 1979 American Science Fiction movie, directed by Robert Wise, and based on the classic Star Trek television series. The film stars the original cast of the series including William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForrest Kelly, George Takei, Walter Koenig, James Dohan and Nichelle Nichols while introducing new cast members Persis Khambatta as Lt. Ilia and Stephen Collins as Captain Decker. The script for the film was adapted by Harold Livingston from an Alan Dean Foster story called "In Thy Image" which had originally been planned as the pilot episode of a new television series called Star Trek Phase II. Set a few years after the events of the television series, the film depicts an alien force in the form of a mysterious energy cloud approaching Earth, destroying all in its path, neccessitating James T. Kirk (William Shatner) now an Admiral to take command of the Enterprise once again to investigate. The film was a large financial success, a fact normally credited to the Star Trek fandom's hunger for a continuation of the series. Critics panned the movie, however, for focussing too heavily on special effects of slow moving spaceships and a decided lack of a solid plot, action, or adequate characterization. Ronin Fox Trax released their riff of this film in November of 2008, it is available through iRiffs and Gumroad. The track was made with the Directors Edition DVD and will only sync with the 132 minute Directors Cut version. The script for the riff was written by Ronin Fox and by Shane Tourtellotte of the iRiff group PS Productions. Synopsis and Preview Begin A Klingon ship and a Starfleet monitoring station both become victims of an alien energy cloud moving through space. As it passes by, the cloud vaporizes everything in its path, leaving nothing behind. Meanwhile, Spock, having left Starfleet, is living back on Vulcan and attempting to achieve Kolinahr, a rite of passage that indicates he has purged himself of all emotion. Before being presented with a medal he is overcome with emotion due to an unexplained psycic connection with the alien force within the cloud. At Earth, Admiral Kirk takes an extended trip via shuttle to dock with the Enterprise, only to inform the new Captain, Will Decker, that he is taking over command. Kirk sites his experience and familiarity with the Enterprise as the reason for taking command, though Decker points out that since the Enterprise has been refit his familiarity is now meaningless. Kirk is undeterred, and gathers more crew members, including a couple officers who die horribly in a transporter accident that no one talks about minutes later, even as they beam up more people. The only acknowledgement of the tradgedy is that Will Decker now has to perform the duties of the now dead Science Officer. Dr. McCoy returns with a fabulous beard, but horribly shaves before his next scene. The Enterprise is more or less broken, as once it is taken to warp speed an engine imbalance causes a wormhole effect that nearly destroys the ship. Decker proves his worth by disobeying an order to shoot an oncoming asteroid with a phaser and instead using a photon torpedo. He later explains that due to changes in the refit, the phaser would not have worked and that he had just saved everyone's life. People pretend to care, but no one likes Decker. While the Enterprise is adrift, Spock arrives via shuttle and he's immidiately commissioned back into Starfleet by Kirk. Spock takes over as Science Officer, since Decker didn't want to do it anyway, that's fine. Spock then helps Scotty repair the engines. The Enterprise intercepts the cloud and is probed and attacked. An electrical disturbance attacks Spock then abducts Lt Ilia, an alien navigator who had a former romantic relationship with Decker. She is replaced by a robotic probe that looks and sounds like her, but has a device implanted in her throat. She speaks for the alien presence, which calls itself V'Ger. Between Decker flirting with the Ilia drone and Spock sneaking out with a space suit to mind meld with the alien force, the crew establishes communication and find out that V'Ger is actually Voyager 6, an Earth probe that had achieved consiousness and had returned back to find who it calls The Creator. V'Ger rejects the idea that humans are The Creator because it views carbon based life as inferior, and it intends to destroy all organic life on Earth in order to find the true Creator. Decker, using the romantic feelings that are still preserved inside the Ilia probe volunteers to merge wtih V'Ger in order to show it the truth and let it fully experience The Creator, if you know what I mean, giggity. When he does, the cloud disperses, V'Ger disapears and Spock theorizes that they had just witnessed the birth of a new life form. End Cast and Crew *William Shatner as James T. Kirk *Leonard Nimoy as Spock *Deforest Kelley as Leonard McCoy *James Doohan as Montgomery Scott *Walter Koenig as Pavel Chekov *Nichelle Nichols as Uhura *George Takei vs Hikaru Sulu *Persis Khambatta as Ilia *Stephen Collis as Willard Decker Quotes Notes *Star Trek The Motion Picture was the first riff by Ronin Fox Trax to be made available through iRiffs. External Links *Star Trek The Motion Picture Riff on Rifftrax *Star Trek The Motion Picture Riff on Gumroad *Star Trek The Motion Picture (Directors Edition) on Amazon *Star Trek The Motion Picture (Directors Edition) on Amazon Instant Video Category:Ronin Fox Trax Category:Star Trek Category:IRiffs Category:William Shatner